China’s Ministry of State Security Directed the Theft of COVID-19 Research and the Exploitation of Microsoft Exchange Server Vulnerabilities, Known Publicly as the Indiscriminate ‘HAFNIUM’ Intrusion Campaign The Justice Department announced today that Xu Zewei (徐泽伟), 33, of the People’s Republic of China was arrested on July 3 in Italy at the request of the United States.
Xu and his co-defendant, PRC national Zhang Yu (张宇), 44, are charged in a nine-count indictment, unsealed today in the Southern District of Texas, for their involvement in computer intrusions between February 2020 and June 2021, including the indiscriminate HAFNIUM computer intrusion campaign that compromised thousands of computers worldwide, including in the United States. Xu was arrested in Milan, Italy, and will face extradition proceedings.
Read more…
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
Sign up for the Cyber Security Review Newsletter
The latest cyber secnews and insights delivered right to your inbox.
Related:
- Ransomware attack inflames intelligence scrutiny
May 16, 2017
The “Wanna Cry” ransomware attack producing global shockwaves has renewed focus on the activities of the National Security Agency (NSA) and how the government decides to disclose cyber vulnerabilities to the private sector. The ransomware campaign, which broke out on Friday and has spread to at least 150 countries and 300,000 machines, is widely believed to ...
- Donald Trump signs executive order on cybersecurity
May 13, 2017
President Donald Trump has signed an executive order to increase the White House’s role in the nation’s cybersecurity. The order assigns responsibility for protecting federal networks and critical infrastructure to the executive branch of government. The executive order declares that the heads of executive departments and agencies are to be held accountable for managing the cybersecurity risk ...
- NSA Admits They’re Reviewing Government Use of Kaspersky Software
May 13, 2017
Kaspersky Lab is stuck in the middle of a rather nasty fight between Washington and Moscow as the Russian-based anti-virus provider is being investigated by the US intelligence agencies. Following news that US officials were more and more concerned about how Russian spies could use Kaspersky’s software to spy on Americans and sabotage US systems, the ...
- Wikileaks Unveils CIA’s Man-in-the-Middle Attack Tool
May 5, 2017
Wikileaks has published a new batch of the Vault 7 leak, detailing a man-in-the-middle (MitM) attack tool allegedly created by the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to target local networks. Since March, WikiLeaks has published thousands of documents and other secret tools that the whistleblower group claims came from the CIA. This latest batch is the ...
- Air Force knocking down stovepipes to shore up space cybersecurity
May 3, 2017
Cybersecurity is a growing concern for everyone who relies computers. The U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center (SMC) faces unique challenges, however, because it uses an extensive array of ground systems that in some cases are decades old to communicate with the individual satellites and constellations the U.S. military relies on during peacetime ...
- Pentagon Challenges White Hats with New “Hack the Air Force” Bug Bounty Program
April 27, 2017
The Pentagon is launching its largest bug bounty project thus far, this time asking hackers to find flaws in the Air Force’s platforms. “Hack the Air Force” will be open not only to experts in the United States but also from the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, or, in other words, what we’ve come ...